by Alexis Booker ‘23 United States citizens demonstrated their enthusiasm to vote in November of 2020, creating the largest voter turnout in American history with almost 160 million voters total. Both Democrats and Republicans showed up to the polls displaying their strength in numbers. Joe Biden then prevailed and was sworn in on January 20, 2021. Now over a year … Read More
by Lizzy Hermosilla ‘23 In October, Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen released documents containing data from internal research showing the company’s adverse effects on the minds of young people. Later that month, Facebook and its affiliates rebranded as Meta. The documents, now referred to as the Facebook Papers, contain various troubling statistics about the effects of Instagram, a Meta affiliate, on … Read More
by Alex Braun ‘23 In the digital world, privacy is more of an abstract idea than a reality. Millions of users everywhere would like to think that they are safe on the Internet, or that through the use of anti virus software they are protecting themselves from unwanted surveillance and tracking. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Every website visited … Read More
by Naomi Bang ‘23 Twitter introduced a new photo removal policy designed to protect users’ privacy and prevent people from publishing private images or videos without consent. This update is in response to increasing concerns over media misuse as a tool to harass or share information about individuals without consent. But the vague guidelines of the policy have sparked confusion … Read More
by Jena Le ‘23 Catfishes are people who pretend to be someone they are not online. They are dangerous, but hard to detect at times. Sherwood recently had an issue with catfishing at the beginning of the school year. Someone under the alias “Jessica Masons” pretended to be a new Sherwood student on Instagram. Masons messaged multiple sophomore girls and … Read More
by Rachel Klein ‘22 Almost every teenager today knows about or has used the website Omegle, where people can chat or video chat with strangers on the Internet. Immediately after the site was launched in 2009, it was gaining hundreds of thousands of viewers per day. In more recent times, as a result of TikTok and everyone having limited social … Read More
by Daisia Smith ‘22 Many students can attest that fictional books helped them as children and young adults learn things about themselves and their world that they never had the personal experience to understand on their own. However, efforts to censor what students may access and read has intensified in recent months. Across the country, parents and even some school … Read More
by Nicholas Schade ‘23 Up until a recent spike in Covid-19 cases from the Omicron Variant, Zoom’s stock value had been steadily decreasing for several months. On August 31, its stock value dropped 17 percent, or around $60, and is down around 44.5 percent overall this year. While these lowered stocks could hint at a blip in Zoom’s buildup, expect … Read More
By Apurva Mahajan ‘22 For the past 32 years in Congress, an existing bill has called for reparations for slavery but has never gotten a floor vote. Bill H.R.40 would establish a commission to examine slavery and racial discrimination from 1619 to the present and recommend possible remedies. This past April, Democratic lawmakers called for a vote on H.R.40 and … Read More
By Tatiana Rodriguez ‘23 Racial profiling is the assumption that someone has committed or may commit a crime based on their skin color, and such biases sometimes leads to the wrongful conviction and imprisonment of black men due to the stereotype and the racism they face. According to the Innocence Project, an organization to put an end on wrongful convictions, … Read More